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09/02/2010

Not sure when or where or why she said it. But according to Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president Albert Mohler Jr., writing in the 2008 book The Popular Encyclopedia of Apologetics: Surveying the Evidence, National Organization For Marriage chair Maggie Gallagher did in fact say this about gay people:

Okay, first off: Ridiculous! "Homosexuality did not exist"? There is homosexuality in the historical record dating back as far as it goes. Some of these reports are more likely and valid than others, admittedly. But to act as if two men and two women were nothing more than "sodomy" or "buggery" partners prior to the nineteenth century is as silly as saying that dinosaurs never existed. Oh wait a minute...

But beyond just denial, there's also the element of perspective. There are many, many things that were considered taboo or forbidden or, conversely, acceptable, that we now look back on with humor, embarrassment, or shame. Because that's what society does: Learns and grows from its mistakes, ideally remedying all past oppressions within a more enlightened people's powers. Of course there aren't glowing reports of weekly gay unions from the year 1100 -- gays, witches, liberated women, and those with the crazy theory that the world was round (among many, many others) were all too busy watching their backs to write any of it down! Many were shamed into silence or repression or worse. Much, much worse. So we'd seriously caution Maggie about showing unqualified nostalgia for past human treatments, even if she's only feigning these feelings for her own political purposes.